More and more Americans are learning less and less about the history of their own country.
The latest results from “The Nation’s Report Card” revealed that eighth-grade scores in American history continued to tumble, with fully 40% of these young people failing to meet even basic level standards. A 2024 survey of college students demonstrated equally dismal results, finding that many young men and women graduate from our institutions of higher learning “without even a rudimentary grasp of America’s history and political system.”
President of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) Michael Poliakoff warned of the consequences of this ignorance:
The dismal results of our survey show that current students and recent college graduates have little idea of the American past or its core principles and values, no guide to take them through the roiling controversies facing us today or to enable them to defend and protect the free institutions that are the glory of our nation and an inspiration to the world.
Before older Americans start a smack-down of ignorant young people, they might look at the beam in their own eye. I have a sneaking suspicion there are plenty of adults who couldn’t pass muster on the eighth-grade test or the university survey.
This lack of familiarity with the past has dire consequences for the present. You can’t love a person you don’t know, and the same holds true for a nation. Young people who don’t learn the history of their country are left orphans, innocents without ancestors, vulnerable to any ideology that wanders down the road. Our recent past offers a textbook demonstration of this truth.
We can point to all sorts of culprits responsible for this decline: the leftist, even Marxist, departments of history in many of our universities; the failure of many public schools to teach straight-up history rather than some twisted, incoherent narrative; the use of textbooks like Howard Zinn’s “A People’s History of the United States.”
Turning this ship of folly will take years. Today’s kindergartners will likely graduate high school as unlettered in American history as their parents.
So it’s up to parents, grandparents and guardians to bring American history to the children. Here are three painless and even fun ways to make that happen from the comfort of your living room.
Sing Some History
Search online, and you’ll find all sorts of resources teaching American songs. “We Sing America,” provides a catchy mix of songs and quotes from historical figures designed for kids from preschool through elementary school. Children on these videos sing songs like “You’re a Grand Old Flag,” the national anthem, and recite lines from people like Martin Luther King Jr. and Patrick Henry.
Older students and adults can easily find and enjoy all sorts of music online, from the Revolutionary War to the Civil War to cowboy songs and the hits of the Depression Years. Connect the songs to historical events, and you’re giving your kids some wonderful links to our past.
Watch Some History
As with songs, the internet offers a cornucopia of entertaining lessons from our past. Cartoons like “Liberty Kids” will appeal to elementary students, while high schoolers will enjoy everything from HBO series “John Adams” to Ken Burns’ “The Civil War.” Hollywood movies like “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” contain fine lessons in civics and history.
You’ll also find instructional films in abundance. Free School’s YouTube videos, “American History for Children,” covers a multitude of subjects, like the Pilgrims, the Louisiana Purchase, and the Statue of Liberty. In addition to lectures for older students, films bring alive the past through people who experienced it. In one 1932 interview, for example, we meet Elihu Thomson an engineer and inventor, who was born in 1853 and who gives us some idea of life in the latter half of the 19th century.
Take a Sofa Tour
All sorts of museums, battlefields and parks invite us to virtual excursions. You can tour Mount Vernon, visit the Smithsonian, and for a fee, go on live virtual field trips, such as those offered by the World War II Museum in New Orleans, all from home. Washington, D.C., alone has at least 17 of these museums featuring online exploration, many with accompanying lessons for the kids.
And of course, there are libraries and bookstores all across the land, each one containing hundreds of biographies and histories for kids, adolescents and adults.
Creator of America’s first dictionary Noah Webster once said:
Every child in America should be acquainted with his own country. He should read books that furnish him with ideas that will be useful to him in life and practice. As soon as he opens his lips, he should rehearse the history of his own country; he should lisp the praise of liberty and of those illustrious heroes and statesmen who have wrought a revolution in her favor.
As Webster knew, familiarity with the past means more than preserving our history. It is the map and compass for our future.
Jeff Minick is a father of four and grandfather to many. A former history, literature, and Latin teacher, Jeff now writes prolifically for The Epoch Times, American Essence Magazine, and several other publications.
This culture article was made possible by The Fred & Rheta Skelton Center for Cultural Renewal, a project of 1819 News. To comment on this article, please email culture@1819news.com. The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy or position of 1819 News.
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